Jailed ex-Ukrainian officer says HUR superiors approved Monaco bomb plot, offers no evidence

A Ukrainian ex-security officer jailed for killing the woman who planted a bomb in Monaco now says the plot was an official military intelligence operation. He has offered no evidence for it.

Vitalii Zhykovych, speaking from a Kyiv prison in an interview with the BBC arranged through his lawyer, said he was told the operation was cleared at the top of HUR, Ukraine's military intelligence agency. The interview was published Thursday, Oct. 8.

The bombing

The attack happened in Monaco on June 29. Ukrainian-born businessman Vadym Yermolayev, his partner and his 13-year-old son were walking home from dinner on the seafront when a bomb left in a bag on their doorstep went off as they approached.

Surveillance video shows Anastasia Berezovska walking just ahead of the group and leaving the bag. The blast apparently shocked even her.

Yermolayev and his son were badly hurt. His partner, Anna Nasobina, suffered what the BBC described as catastrophic injuries. Yermolayev has called their survival "nothing short of a miracle."

Berezovska faced charges of attempted murder, placing an explosive device in a public place with criminal intent, and criminal conspiracy. An Interpol red notice was issued for her. She travelled across Europe, then returned to Ukraine on July 3.

The killing

Prosecutors say two men picked Berezovska up beside a motorway after she returned. Zhykovych loaded the gun on the way to the kill site, they allege. When they arrived, he distracted her while an active-duty HUR officer, Vladyslav Reut, fired the fatal shots.

Her body was found in woods west of Kyiv on July 7 with gunshot wounds to the head. Both men were arrested and charged with her murder.

Reut first confessed to investigators and led them to the shallow grave. Days later in court he changed his account and blamed Zhykovych.

Zhykovych says he neither killed Berezovska nor sent her to kill anyone.

What Zhykovych now claims

Zhykovych calls himself a "freelancer" for the SBU, Ukraine's security service, and says Berezovska was his "agent." The SBU has described him only as a "former law enforcement officer."

He calls Reut "The Boss" and says Reut "proposed the operation" against Yermolayev. In his words: "As Reut informed me, this operation had been authorized and approved by [his] superiors, who served in the Main Intelligence Directorate of the Ministry of Defense."

He says Reut wanted to use Berezovska as the bomber. Zhykovych says he refused because she was not fully trained, and Reut agreed to send her for reconnaissance instead. After that, he alleges, Reut dealt with her directly and supplied the explosives.

He also said intelligence officers "close to the agency's current and former leadership" were linked to the plot. He gave no evidence for that.

According to Zhykovych, Reut described the bombing as revenge for Yermolayev "funding the annexation" of Crimea. Kyiv had sanctioned Yermolayev over business dealings in Russia-occupied Crimea. "In my view, this constitutes grounds for the operation," Zhykovych said.

Berezovska reportedly called Zhykovych the day after the blast and said she planted the bomb for money from Reut. "$50,000 doesn't just lie on the streets," she is quoted as saying.

A story that has shifted

Zhykovych's latest account does not match what he said in court in July. There he said, "Someone had ordered this target from the civilian side." That appeared to point away from government officials.

Reut has also changed his story, from confession to blaming Zhykovych. The two co-defendants are now pointing at each other, and Zhykovych is pointing at HUR.

HUR has not addressed Zhykovych's claims directly. The agency has said it is "committed to a full investigation" and is providing "comprehensive support" to law enforcement bodies.

Yermolayev has said he believes serving HUR officers were involved in the attack on him.

What is on the table

A man charged with murder, who has already given two different versions of who ordered the hit, is now naming senior officers of a state intelligence agency. He rests that on what a co-defendant told him, and Reut disputes Zhykovych's version of events.

That does not make the claim false. It does mean the only support for it is the word of a defendant with every reason to push blame upward.

If Ukrainian military intelligence did approve a bomb attack on a civilian in a foreign country, one that wounded a child, that is a serious matter for Kyiv's Western backers. If it did not, someone still sent a bomber to Monaco, and a witness is dead.

No one else has been charged over the Monaco bombing itself. Berezovska, the only person identified as having carried it out, was killed before she could be tried. The question of who paid her and who ordered the attack remains open.